The US Congressis to consider passing
legislation to prevent American firms from collecting data to build
profiles of people's web surfing habits.
The proposed law is still in draft form, according to
reports from Associated Press.
Rick Boucher, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce
Subcommittee on Communications, Technology and the Internet, is
drafting the bill.
The move comes days after a coalition of 10 privacy campaigners,
led by the Center for Digital Democracy, published a
13 page report on online behavioural tracking and targeting
concerns and solutions.
The coalition said entities that capture web behaviours "seek to
create, compile, and use detailed profiles revealing consumers'
interests, activities, and other personal characteristics without
limit", mainly to increase response rates to advertising.
"Without controls, profiles can and will be used for commercial,
governmental and other purposes in ways that may harm consumers,"
it said.
The advertising industry and the Federal Trade Commission have
published codes of behaviour to regulate behaviour profiling, but
privacy activists remain concerned.
In the UK, a behaviour profiling firm, Phorm, conducted
secret tests of its technology with BT. The
resulting controversy led the department of business,
innovation and skills to endorse its use only under tight
conditions.
These include a requirement that potential advertisers publish
explicit details of what information they would collect and how
they would use it. Consumers would have to read it before opting-in
to receive advertising based on the profiles that Phorm built up
from the websites they visited and the apparent interests their
visits disclosed.
Advertising industry spokesmen have rejected opt-in mechanisms
as preventing consumers from getting what they want more
efficiently, and as curbs on their freedom of commercial
speech.
However, the European Commission has also raised concerns about
the effect of uncontrolled data collection on users' privacy.
Speaking at a
conference in data collection and profiling in March, consumer
commissioner Meglena Kuneva said: "Consumer rights must adapt to
technology, not be crushed by it. The current situation with regard
to privacy, profiling and targeting is not satisfactory."
The
European Data Protection Supervisor has made developing a
position on profiling a priority this year.